A couple in Rangeley barely made it out of their log home Weds night. The home is gone. Firefighters say it was caused by putting smoldering coals in a paper bag and setting that on their snow covered porch, just outside the door... I'm not gonna bash them... obviously, I'm glad they survived. What an incredibly expensive lesson to learn the hard way though. As most of us have seen, coals can stay plenty hot enough to start a fire, sitting in a covered metal bucket, over 2 days later. Could be that this couple was new to burning fire wood. Sad.
I have a friend who burned down their house the same way, ashes in a paper bag, put in the screened porch. This was about 10 years ago, fortunately no injuries and house was rebuilt, but it took a couple of years.
Always so sad when folks lose their homes because of some sort of distraction or lack of knowledge. It happens.
This is one issue that is overlooked by many. I’ll let my ashes sit in a metal bucket with secure lid for a week before I dump it. Even then I cover it with snow. Glad they are ok.
It seem's you hear at least one example of this stupidity every year. Darwin's Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection. More individuals are produced each generation that can survive. Phenotypic variation exists among individuals and the variation is heritable. Those individuals with heritable traits better suited to the environment will survive. Darwin's Theory of Natural Selection - NDSU Population and Evolutionary Genetics
Unfortunately it happens too often. I remember the incident when kids died in CT a few years back on Christmas eve. Same MO, the fireplace was cleaned so Santa could get down the chimney.
Um? Paper bag full of ashes? Really? Set on a wood porch! No offense to humans in general. But. Fuelrod may have a valid point here
Sad. We all do stupid things from time to time. So far I haven't killed myself with stupid, but I hardly think it is because I am "better suited" in a Darwinian sense.
Ayuh... I'm with ya BP... my stupid has swatted at my mortality more than I like to admit. I'm sure this couple that lost their home will wish they could have a do-over... many times. In the end, I guess it's another lesson for all of us to pay attention to the little stuff and not get distracted... when playing with fire...
That is really sad but still difficult to believe anyone could do that... But must have thought the coals were cold.
That's what my friend thought. Also she wasn't very familiar with wood stoves; the house had one, but they didn't use it often. It is something to learn, that coals last in ashes for days.
Every time I read one of these threads I think of what my insurance values are, I'm tempted to put the pets in the car and clean out the stove....unless insurance doesn't cover such stupidity. lol
I had another friend whose toddler burnt the house down by twiddling the knob on the toaster oven one Sunday morning, when everyone was in bed. They had to live in a trailer in the yard for two years until their house got rebuilt. And I got burnt out of a group apartment in Boston when a roommate who was a waiter, and home all day when everyone else was at work, flicked a cigarette butt in a trash can and went and took a long shower. Came out of the bathroom and the place was blazing.
When my dad was a little boy he woke up to a house fully involved, and woke the rest of the family to escape.
